


Better Together

by Storiesfromthebluebox



Series: Life After Scumbag [2]
Category: The Young Ones
Genre: Fluff, Friendship/Love, M/M, Reunions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-01
Updated: 2015-03-01
Packaged: 2018-03-15 20:43:44
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,087
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3461360
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Storiesfromthebluebox/pseuds/Storiesfromthebluebox
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The sequel to He Was A Friend Of Mine. Roughly a year later, where are Rick and Vyvyan now? We'll find out as we join them on a reunion with all four of the Young Ones.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Better Together

**Author's Note:**

> This picks up approximately a year after the events of He Was A Friend Of Mine. Obviously, Rick and Vyvyan started dating from the moment where we left them, but what ever came of it? And what ever happened to Mike and Neil, anyway? You'll read the answers to these questions and more below.
> 
> It's mostly really just domestic fluff and an excuse to write about the guys being (mostly) mature, happy and fulfilled. Which their younger selfs so rarely are. 
> 
> I hope you enjoy!

“Rick, have you seen my dinner jacket?” 

Rick was sitting with his legs stretched on the coffee table. It was difficult to focus on The Guardian while Vyvyan walked around with a towel around his waist and shouted things from the shower and bedroom every now and then.

He scoffed. “You’re not going to wear _that_ old thing, are you? Come on, Vyvyan, you can do better.”

Vyvyan peeked around the corner of the bedroom. “Hey! I wore that to our first date!”

“That wasn’t a date, Vyvyan. We just went for ice cream because Mike and Neil had went home for the holidays…” He stopped himself and looked at the other man. “Wait. Blimey. Vyvyan, did you consider our afternoon at The Sugar Bear a date?”

Vyvyan smiled. “Yep”.

“That’s unbelievable!” Rick gasped. 

“My life was full of hardships”.

“How could I have not noticed this?” Rick continued. “I wonder how many other dates I’ve been on without knowing.”

“Not many, I’d assume”, Vyvyan said. 

“Oh ha-ha Vyvyan. Very funny. Anyway, you’re not wearing that jacket”. He tried to turn his attention back to the paper.

“Okay Rick. You decide what I’m wearing, then.”

“Oh, Lordy Lordy”, Rick said, tossing The Guardian aside and rolling with his eyes. “Do I need to do everything in this household?”

A wide grin spread on Vyvyan’s face. “Yeah! As a matter of fact you do, Rick. You’re the housewifey”.

“Vyvyan?” Rick said, as he stood up and looked at his partner in a cool manner.

“Yeah?”

“Shut up”. He walked past him, into their small and messy bedroom.

“What? I don’t get a kiss?” Vyvyan teased. 

“I’m your partner Vyvyan, not your housewife”, Rick said. 

Even though he said it angrily, he was secretly happy to have an excuse to use that word. They only decided on calling each other that for a few months – ever since they moved in together. Since men still weren’t allowed to marry one another for some silly reason, they had to find a different word to describe their relationship than ‘husband’. It just hadn’t quite sufficed to call him his ‘boyfriend’. They could have been boyfriends back when they were in Scumbag College, but they were older now. Rick wanted to make it clear to everyone they encountered that they were more than just two blokes living together, especially when they were women. _Fat chance, woman,_ he thought every time when some bird looked at Vyvyan in a flirty way. _He’s mine._  
He didn’t mind casually announcing to complete strangers they were shagging, which sometimes frustrated Vyvyan greatly. But even now everyone knew them as the queer couple on the block, Rick needed that kind of establishment. They had been just two blokes living together for long enough. Those times were over.

Granted, many things had gone back to the same old routine when they had moved in together. They still quarreled and liked throwing around insults and objects from time to time. Actually, they did that a lot. But there was a different sentiment to their fights now. They more oftenly resulted in a snog than bashing each other’s brains in. 

“Are ya?” Vyvyan asked, still grinning. “Are you sure you’re not my wife? Because honestly, your haircut does look a bit like a girlies…” Rick tossed a coat hanger to his head. The other man ducked just in time, laughing. The coat hanger bounced off the wall.

“Look, do you want me to help you or NOT?” Rick asked. “We haven’t seen Mike and Neil for years, and I don’t want you to show up _dwessed_ like a hobo”.

“Go on then”, Vyvyan said. He plopped down on their double bed. “Use your female intuition”. 

“Vyvyan, stop being sexist. We’ve been over this”.

“Oh, sorry, did I say female intuition? I meant: your undeniable talents to be girly”, Vyvyan replied.

Rick shot him a look, but figured he’d be the mature one and not let Vyvyan provoke him. He sighed and put on his brilliant smile. “Very well then. I know you’re only jealous because I’m naturally fashionable and you’re not, so I’ll be genewous and help you”.

“Great!” Vyvyan rolled over and yawned. “Make it quick, we have to leave in an hour”. 

Instead of getting pissed, Rick couldn’t help himself and giggled. He picked up a pillow off the floor and lightly slapped Vyvyan with it. “You’re impossible”, he sighed dramatically. “Honestly, I don’t know why I bother with you sometimes”.

“That’s easy. It’s because you like my –“

“Vyvyan, please stop”. Rick tried to sound annoyed, but had to suck in his cheeks not to smile. “You’re distwacting me”.

“Really? How’s that?” 

“You know perfectly well what I mean”.

Vyvyan played stupid. “Oh, I’m sorry Rick, my mistake, I didn’t realize talking about my knob made you-”

“Shut up”, Rick said, and he leaned down to kiss him. Vyvyan slid a hand in his neck, pulling him down on top of him.

“How much time did you say we had?” Rick asked weakly.

Vyvyan shot a quick glance at the alarm clock by the bedside. “ ‘Bout an hour”.

“Do you think we have time for a quick shag?”

“Well”, Vyvyan said, pretending like he had to think about it. “It depends, I s’ppose. Are you going to be a good girl then?”

“I hate you”.

One of the perks of being with Vyvyan was guaranteed good sex. He’d never forget the first time they’d done it, right here in this bed. Not only had it been their first time, it had been Rick’s first time with a man, period. And truth be told, he hadn’t had a great deal of sexual experience with women either. Vyvyan had been surprisingly gentle and patient about it. He had soon discovered that once you were past the really painful, awful part, it was actually really nice. Heavenly, even. 

Anyway, ever since, he had gotten quite good at it. _They_ had gotten quite good at it. Short, long, bottom, top, sitting, lying down: they did it all. Especially in those first few months of seeing each other, the scent of sex and horniness was often palpable in the bedroom – and living room. He could smell it now, as they lay beside each other.

“We have exactly 15 minutes to get dwessed and get out of the house”, Rick said. He looked at his partner, and giggled. 

“Yeah, let’s go”, Vyvyan sighed. He swung his legs over the edge of the bed. “Time to meet Mike and Neil”. 

“God, I wonder how they _are_ ”, Rick pondered, looking at the ceiling.

“You’ll find out soon enough if you get your clothes on, ploppy pants”, Vyvyan said, as he tossed him his trousers.

They hurriedly got dressed in ten minutes. Vyvyan grabbed his glasses and his blue, short-sleeved buttoned shirt out of the wardrobe. It was a few years old and a little grubby, but it was one of Rick favourite shirts. He topped it off with black jeans. Rick slipped back into his casual turquoise shirt, black jacket and blue jeans. He slid one sweaty hand through his greasy, half-long hair. He had cut it a bit since he was seeing Vyvyan, but he found he quite liked the look. 

As Vyvyan walked ahead, onto the sunny pavement, Rick couldn’t help but tugging his partner’s shirt and stealing a kiss. He just looked too irresistible not to. Even if Vyvyan was less out in the open about their relationship than Rick, he didn’t mind kissing in public. And if somebody stared, he was never too shy to shout things like: “Oi! What are you looking at, snotface?”

They took Vyvyan’s old red Ford Fiesta to drive. The place where they had agreed on meeting Mike and Neil was some coffee place in EastLondon called Climpson & Sons. It was about a half an hour drive, and Vyvyan was apparently determined to loudly sing along with a cassette player of The Damned all the way. The guitars of ‘Love Song’ blasted out of their speakers as they pulled off the parking lot and onto the street. 

"Vyvyan, turn that down please", Rick said calmly, his voice barely audible above the music.

"WHAT?" Vyvyan yelled, turning it up a notch.

"I said: turn it _down"._

His partner just smiled and started drumming on the dashboard. "Just for you, heeeeere's a love song", he screeched, as out of tune as humanly possible.

Rick reached out to the volume button, but Vyvyan beat him to it.

“I’m sorry, Missus”, Vyvyan said. “Still love me?” He pulled a sad puppy face, which he knew Rick was not immune to.

“Just, shut up and drive”, Rick murmured, looking ahead of him. But he could see the corners of Vyvyan’s mouth curling up. He couldn’t suppress a tiny smile himself.

As they drove, with the music at a low volume, it started to dawn on Rick they were really about to see Mike and Neil again. He didn’t like to admit it, but he hadn’t given their previous two housemates much thought in all those years. He couldn’t tell why: that’s just the way life worked, he supposed. There had even been a time when he hadn’t thought about Vyvyan, until that day he had walked into the doctor’s office almost a year ago. But Mike and Neil... sure he'd thought of them, when he was memorizing. But he had never pictured them in a different life. Probably because he had no idea how to picture that. As they got closer though, his curiousity started to grow.  


It took a bit of time to find a good parking place, and they finally parked it a few blocks away from the café. They walked with their hands loosely connected: Vyvyan’s index finger hooked around his thumb. It was just warm enough to walk without a jacket, and the sun warmed his face. Climpson & Sons was a tiny, cozy little café that looked like it dated from back in the Victorian Era. It was Neil’s pick: according to Vyvyan the former hippie had told him over the phone it was his favourite spot. 

They casually strolled into the small entrance hall, their hands still touching, when Rick abruptly pulled back his thumb. As they exchanged a look, he could tell his partner was thinking the same: _they don’t know. We haven’t told them yet. Best to make a casual entrance._  
Vyvyan gave him a small, almost imperceptible nod before they went through the second door. The place wasn’t packed with people, but there were only a few empty tables. Rick’s eyes wandered over the place until he saw them: they were sitting at their left, next to the window. Mike looked as if he’d walked right out of his memory: dressed up in a grey suit, his jacket folded neatly over his arm. The only thing about him that had changed was his now grey hair. Back in the day, it had been easy to forget Mike was quite a bit older than the rest of them. He must be almost forty now, Rick realized. _Blimey._ And he was still every bit as cool-looking.

Neil on the other hand, had changed. Or so it seemed, because on second glance he hadn’t actually changed that much at all. He’d just lost the long hair. Short tufts of hair peeked out from under a Jamaican hat. Furthermore he was wearing a grey shirt, a similar colour to the sweater he often worn in their student days, a bunch of eccentric necklaces and a colourful scarf.

It was Mike who noticed them first. 

“Look who it is, Vyv the Great!”

“Aha! It’s President Mike!” Vyvyan responded, and he grinned widely as Mike pulled him into a short, manly hug. The kind where you lean in slightly and slap on each other’s shoulders, which is what they did.

“Ah, the peoples poet in the flesh,” Mike said, as he gave him a similar hug to the one he’d given Vyvyan. “Good to see you, Rick”

“Thanks Mike, you too”.

“Hello, guys,” Neil said, waving from his seat.

“Neil, what makes you think you don’t have to get up to greet us properly?” Vyvyan asked.

“Oh, uhm, I didn’t think…”

“Oh come on, Neil”, Rick snorted. “We’re not _childwen_ anymore, are we? Get up like a man and give us a hug”.

“All right”. And Neil stood up to exchange a slightly awkward hug with the both of them.

“We’ve already had one coffee”, Neil explained as they sat down. “You were a bit late, so we didn’t know…”

“That’s all right”, Vyvyan said. “We needed some time to find a place to park”.

There was an expression of wonder on Neil’s face. “You drove here together?” he asked.

The look that Rick and Vyvyan exchanged was one of embarrassment. 

“Uhm. Well. I don’t have a car, you see”, Rick tried. 

“You couldn’t have taken the bus?” Neil was genuinely confused.

“No. I mean: yes. But. I can’t. I can’t go on buses. The seats are so tehwible it once gave me a hernia”.

“Oh wow, really?” Neil frowned. “I didn’t know that could happen. I always take the bus”.

“Yes, well, I’m in a poor condition. I was in an accident…”

“Rick”, Vyvyan interrupted him calmly, but Rick nervously babbled on. 

“Years ago, it was very painful, and…”

“Rick!” Vyvyan shouted. That made him shut up. A few strangers looked over at their table.

“Sorry everyone, my partner over here had just needed to cool off a bit”, Vyvyan announced publicly, giving Rick a pat on the back. Everyone quickly stared back into their coffee. 

“All right. Either you’ve joined the FBI or something else is going on. Mike the Cool Person is very intrigued”, Mike commented.

“You see”, Vyvyan started, “Me and Rick, we started seeing each other about a year ago, and uh…” He paused. “We’ve moved in together, and uh…” 

Everyone patiently waited for him to finish the sentence, even if they probably understood what he was trying to say by now.

“Well, we’re together”, Vyvyan concluded.

“Oh WHOAW!” Neil yelled, jumping up from his seat. A few heads turned over to their table again, but they didn’t pay attention this time. “That’s amazing! Rick and Vyvyan. Yes, of course! Of course. I should have known. This makes so much sense! Oh man. I’m so happy”. 

“Thanks Neil”, Rick said.

“Well, well. The Kurt and Courtney of the house have finally ended up together”, Mike said with a smile. “Who’d have thought, eh?”

“I’ll buy you a round of drinks to celebrate”, Neil said. “What do you want, Vyv?”

“Tea for me please, Neil”, Vyvyan said.  


After Neil had memorized all of their orders, he went to stand in line for the bar, leaving Rick and Vyvyan to exchange a sheepish smile. The cat was out of the bag - within five minutes of their arrival. They didn’t have to wonder how they were going to answer certain questions or wait for the right moment to tell. They could just relax and enjoy their reunion. Soon, Neil returned with all their drinks and they could start to catch up.

As it turned out, things had worked out pretty well for Mike and Neil. Neil was the proud owner of a herb & spice shop nearby, entitled Neil’s Earthly Paradise. He had a girlfriend that he didn’t live together with yet, but Neil sounded happy when he talked about her. From what they could tell, she seemed like the perfect type for Neil. She played the pan flute, was into alternative medicine and it wouldn’t surprise Rick at all if she was the kind of person that had a couple of marihuana plants in her garden and danced at the full moon. That last part was just his own imagination, though. Vyvyan had once told him he shouldn’t make assumptions about people so quickly, and he was trying to work on that.

Mike, after having tried to set up a couple of shady enterprises he didn’t go into detail about, had gone into music management. He was currently managing an upcoming boyband called B-Cool, who were going to be Britain’s next sensation if they were to go on Mike’s word. When they asked him if there was a woman in his life, he just smiled enigmatically, said: “Mike the Cool Person never has a lack of woman in his life”, and took a sip of his coffee. They decided to leave it at that.

They hadn’t made any further plans except for coffee, so when it was almost five, so they decided to look for a place to eat. Eventually they ended up at a cheap but very pleasant restaurant in the area. As they had all switched to alcohol, of course Mike and Neil started asking questions about their relationship. It started out from normal questions such as if they had a lot of fights and who did the cooking, to the weirder questions like if they ever wore each other’s underwear. It made Rick feel a little self-conscious, but Vyvyan answered everything happily and without shame. As he looked at his life partner, who was cracking jokes and talking so vibrantly and confidently, he was overcome with an enormous wave of pride and affection. Now even more than usual, he was ever so grateful for the fact he walked into that doctor’s office that day. He couldn’t imagine what his life would have come to if he wouldn’t have Vyvyan by his side. It would have been a sad life, he knew that.

After they had paid the bill, they said their goodbyes on the sidewalk in front of the restaurant. Mike’s car was parked on the other side, and Neil had to catch the bus. He waved happily before putting his Jamaican hat back on and turning away. 

“That wasn’t so bad, was it?” Vyvyan said, when both of their old friends were out of hearing distance.

Rick didn’t answer. He wrapped an arm around his partner’s waist and kissed him. Vyvyan responded eagerly, and they just stood snogging there for a while, ignoring the things shouted at them from some drunks on the other side of the street. It still felt every bit as ravishing as the first time.

“Come on, let’s get you home, you drunk”, Vyvyan said. He poked him and walked off to the direction of their car. Rick smiled and followed.

**Author's Note:**

> Climpson & Sons is a real coffee place in London.
> 
> http://www.climpsonandsons.com/pages/cafe
> 
> I have never been there, I just found it online. I've read they have very good coffee however, so if you're ever around, pay a visit and let me know. Oh, and it didn't exist yet in the 90s, but oh well.
> 
> If you could leave some feedback, that'd be great!


End file.
